Librarian by Day Bobbi Newman | I'm not that kind of librarian

Actually there are two surveys - one for those working in libraries and one for patrons. If you work in a library and work with ebooks please take a few minutes to take the first survey. Please share the second survey with your patrons. The surveys will be live April 16 through May 18. The survey's are part of a the research Pew is conducting on the role of libraries in the digital age (disclaimer: I serve on the Library Advisory Board). The next report will be available this summer (the first one was released in April). Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Research Center's Internet & Read more [...]

UPDATE 5/1/2012 We have reached the goal! Thank you so much to everyone who donated! I will be at ALA 2012 thanks to your support and generosity! Making the decision to write this post was hard for me, after all I love NPR but pledge drive time drives me a little crazy especially after I’ve donated and it keeps going. But I understand why they do it and I wouldn’t have it any other ways. So, I’m going to be a little self-indulgent. A couple of weeks ago I realized I wouldn’t be able to make the trip to Anaheim for ALA. Some health issues, nothing life threatening, but expensive nevertheless Read more [...]

I recently had the honor to be invited to talk with Kayhan B., Erin Anderson, and Doug Mirams hosts of the Bibliotech podcast. We talked about all sorts of things including but not limited to: ebooks, transiteracy, the echo chamber, change, the future of libraries, and This is What a Librarian Looks Like. Links to articles etc that I mentioned: Nominate a Librarian - John Jackson Great Librarian Write Out - Patrick Sweeney Pew research on Libraries in the Digital Age Library Renewal The Libraries and Transliteracy Project Looks Like Library Science The now infamous ebooks Read more [...]

Before you get too excited about the 21% who have read an ebook in the last year compared it with the 22% who reported not reading a book at all. That compares with 22% who told us they had not read a book in the previous 12 months or didn’t answer a book-reading question in December 2011. That number, the number of people NOT reading books at all in any format, it's going up too. Where did I get this fun and exciting data? Yesterday Pew released it's report on The Rise of e-Reading. The report is full of data related to ereaders, ebooks, and the general reading and book borrowing habits Read more [...]

The OITP Digital Literacy Task Force released it's official definition of digital literacy this week on the District Dispatch blog. The short definition is accompanied by a six page primer (not yet available) that provides more in-depth information. Digital literacy is the ability to use information and communication technologies to find, evaluate, create, and communicate information requiring both cognitive and technical skills. I am part of this task force and one of the reasons I was thrilled to be asked to serve is because I knew that digital literacy was a growing area of discussion Read more [...]